Museum of World War II

Poland moves forward with refocusing history on Polish heroism and victimhood

Published by carolyn on Fri, 2017-04-14 13:44

The Museum of Second World War in Gdansk, Poland which opened on March 23, 2017 in the midst of controversy.


By Carolyn Yeager

POLAND IS MERGING TWO MUSEUMS OF HISTORY INTO ONE – the newly opened World War II Museum in Gdansk with another yet-to-be-established state-sanctioned institution that, when it opens, will be focused solely on Polish heroism during the Nazi occupation of Poland.

The current culture minister under the ruling Law and Justice Party, Piotr Glinski, has been pushing for a merger with a museum that currently exists only on paper, and is dedicated to the Battle of Westerplatte. In November 2016, the New York Times quoted Glinski saying that focusing on the September 1939 battle would better represent “heroic Polish self-defense,” and that the museum in the works failed to put “enough stress on the Polish point of view.”

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News, Slavs, World War II